General News Media

—Q1 2013 shadow inventory shows steep decline—

CoreLogic® (NYSE: CLGX), a leading residential property information, analytics and services provider, today released its May National Foreclosure Report with a supplement featuring quarterly shadow inventory data as of April 2013.

According to CoreLogic analysis:

There were 52,000 completed foreclosures in the U.S. in May 2013, down from 71,000 in May 2012, a year-over-year decrease of 27 percent. On a month-over-month basis, completed foreclosures increased 3.5 percent, from 50,000 in April 2013 to the May level of 52,000.

Current residential shadow inventory as of April 2013 was under 2 million units, representing a supply of 5.3 months. The overall shadow inventory is down 34 percent from its peak in 2010, when it reached 3 million homes, and down 18 percent from a year ago, when it was at 2.4 million.

As a basis of comparison to the 52,000 completed foreclosures reported for May 2013, prior to the decline in the housing market in 2007, completed foreclosures averaged 21,000 per month nationwide between 2000 and 2006. Completed foreclosures are an indication of the total number of homes actually lost to foreclosure. Since the financial crisis began in September 2008, there have been approximately 4.4 million completed foreclosures across the country.

As of May 2013, approximately 1.0 million homes in the U.S. were in some stage of foreclosure, known as the foreclosure inventory, compared to 1.4 million in May 2012, a year-over-year decrease of 29 percent. Month over month, the foreclosure inventory was down 3.3 percent from April 2013 to May 2013. The foreclosure inventory as of May 2013 represented 2.6 percent of all homes with a mortgage compared to 3.5 percent in May 2012.

At the end of May 2013, there are fewer than 2.3 million mortgages, or 5.6 percent, in serious delinquency (SDQ, defined as 90 days or more past due, including those loans in foreclosure or REO). The rate of seriously delinquent mortgages is at its lowest level since December 2008.

“The stock of seriously delinquent homes, which is the main driver of shadow inventory, is at the lowest level since December 2008,” said Dr. Mark Fleming, chief economist for CoreLogic. “Over the last year it has decreased in 42 states by double-digit figures, resulting in rapid declines in shadow inventory for the first quarter of 2013.”

“We continue to see a sharp drop in foreclosures around the country and with it a decrease in the size of the shadow inventory. Affordability, despite the rise in home prices over the past year, and consumer confidence are big contributors to these positive trends,” said Anand Nallathambi, president and CEO of CoreLogic. “We are particularly encouraged by the broad-based nature of the housing market recovery so far in 2013.”

Foreclosure Highlights:

The five states with the highest number of completed foreclosures for the 12 months ending in May 2013 were: Florida (103,000),California (76,000), Michigan (64,000), Texas (51,000) and Georgia (47,000).These five states account for almost half of all completed foreclosures nationally.

The five states with the lowest number of completed foreclosures for the 12 months ending in May 2013 were: District of Columbia (108), Hawaii (453), North Dakota (467), West Virginia (517) and Maine (644).

The five states with the highest foreclosure inventory as a percentage of all mortgaged homes were: Florida (8.8 percent), New Jersey (6.0 percent), New York (4.8 percent), Maine (4.1 percent) and Connecticut (4.1 percent).

The five states with the lowest foreclosure inventory as a percentage of all mortgaged homes were: Wyoming (0.5 percent), Alaska (0.6 percent), North Dakota (0.6 percent), Nebraska (0.8 percent) and Virginia (0.8 percent).

Shadow Inventory Highlights:

As of April 2013, shadow inventory was under 2 million properties, or 5.3 months’ supply, and represented 85 percent of the 2.3 million properties currently seriously delinquent, in foreclosure or REO.

Of the less than 2 million properties currently in the shadow inventory (Figures 1 and 2), 890,000 properties are seriously delinquent (2.4 months’ supply), 761,000 are in some stage of foreclosure (2 months’ supply) and 336,000 are already in REO (0.9 months’ supply).

The value of shadow inventory was $314 billion as of April 2013, down from $386 billion in April 2012 and down from $320 billion six months prior, in October 2012.

CoreLogic estimates the current stock of properties in the shadow inventory, also known as pending supply, by calculating the number of properties that are seriously delinquent, in foreclosure or held as real estate owned (REO) by mortgage servicers, but not currently listed on multiple listing services (MLSs). Transition rates of “delinquency to foreclosure” and “foreclosure to REO” are used to identify the currently distressed unlisted properties most likely to become REO properties. Properties that are not yet delinquent, but may become delinquent in the future, are not included in the estimate of the current shadow inventory. Shadow inventory is typically not included in the official reporting measurements of unsold inventory.

*April data was revised. Revisions are standard, and to ensure accuracy, CoreLogic incorporates newly released data to provide updated results.

To download a copy of the National Foreclosure Report, please visit:

The data in this report represents foreclosure activity reported through May 2013.

This report separates state data into judicial vs. non-judicial foreclosure state categories. In judicial foreclosure states, lenders must provide evidence to the courts of delinquency in order to move a borrower into foreclosure. In non-judicial foreclosure states, lenders can issue notices of default directly to the borrower without court intervention. This is an important distinction since judicial states, as a rule, have longer foreclosure timelines, thus affecting foreclosure statistics.

A completed foreclosure occurs when a property is auctioned and results in the purchase of the home at auction by either a third party, such as an investor, or by the lender. If the home is purchased by the lender, it is moved into the lender’s real estate owned (REO) inventory. In “foreclosure by advertisement” states, a redemption period begins after the auction and runs for a statutory period, e.g., six months. During that period, the borrower may regain the foreclosed home by paying all amounts due as calculated under the statute. For purposes of this Foreclosure Report, because so few homes are actually redeemed following an auction, it is assumed that the foreclosure process ends in “foreclosure by advertisement” states at the completion of the auction.

The foreclosure inventory represents the number and share of mortgaged homes that have been placed into the process of foreclosure by the mortgage servicer. Mortgage servicers start the foreclosure process when the mortgage reaches a specific level of serious delinquency as dictated by the investor for the mortgage loan. Once a foreclosure is “started,” and absent the borrower paying all amounts necessary to halt the foreclosure, the home remains in foreclosure until the completed foreclosure results in the sale to a third party at auction or the home enters the lender’s REO inventory. The data in this report accounts for only first liens against a property and does not include secondary liens. The foreclosure inventory is measured only against homes that have an outstanding mortgage. Homes with no mortgage liens can never be in foreclosure and are, therefore, excluded from the analysis. Approximately one-third of homes nationally are owned outright and do not have a mortgage. CoreLogic has approximately 85 percent coverage of U.S. foreclosure data.

Shadow Inventory Methodology

CoreLogic uses its Loan Performance Servicing and Securities databases to size the number of 90+ day delinquencies, foreclosures and real estate owned (REO) properties. Cure rates, which measure the proportion of loans in one stage of default that cured (versus moving to more severe states of default), are applied to the number of loans in default at each stage of default. CoreLogic calculates the share of loans in default that are currently listed on MLS by matching public record properties in default to MLS active listings. It applies the percentage of defaulted loans that are currently listed to the estimate of outstanding loans that will proceed to further stages of default to calculate the pending supply inventory and adds that to the reported visible inventory. Visible inventory is compiled from CoreLogic ListingTrends. To determine months' supply for visible and shadow inventories, CoreLogic uses the number of non-seasonally adjusted home sales according to CoreLogic data.

Source: CoreLogic

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About CoreLogic

CoreLogic (NYSE: CLGX) is a leading property information, analytics and services provider in the United States and Australia. The company’s combined data from public, contributory and proprietary sources includes over 3.3 billion records spanning more than 40 years, providing detailed coverage of property, mortgages and other encumbrances, consumer credit, tenancy, location, hazard risk and related performance information. The markets CoreLogic serves include real estate and mortgage finance, insurance, capital markets, transportation and government. CoreLogic delivers value to clients through unique data, analytics, workflow technology, advisory and managed services. Clients rely on CoreLogic to help identify and manage growth opportunities, improve performance and mitigate risk. Headquartered in Irvine, Calif., CoreLogic operates in seven countries. For more information, please visit www.corelogic.com.

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